


Climb Into My Arms With Blood On Your Clothes

by SordidDetailsFollowing



Category: Hannibal (TV)
Genre: Blood and Gore, Blood and Violence, Canon-Typical Violence, Dark Will Graham, First Kiss, Guess that's what Hannibal is here to do, Halloween, Horror, M/M, Murder Husbands, Possessive Hannibal Lecter, Post-Episode: s03e13 The Wrath of the Lamb, Sexual Tension, Someone Help Will Graham, Unofficial Sequel, this is basically canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-01
Updated: 2018-11-01
Packaged: 2019-08-14 01:10:41
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,504
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16483211
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SordidDetailsFollowing/pseuds/SordidDetailsFollowing
Summary: It's been nearly a year since the cliff, and Will is living in the fog of a dream.Hannibal comes in the shadow of the night to wake him up.





	Climb Into My Arms With Blood On Your Clothes

**Author's Note:**

> I had to write a Hannibal Halloween work, and this is what happened. Please enjoy these bloody, dramatic murder husbands figuring shit out.
> 
> Work Title:  
> A Glow - Okkervil River

Everything was hazy after the cliff.

After that day.

It was like Will’s whole life had been a dream, and for one perfect hour he had _woken up_. Had looked at the world with fresh bright eyes and seen things as they were. As they were meant to be. 

And then they had fallen.

And Will hadn’t meant to survive. Hadn’t meant for either of them to survive. There was supposed to be nothing; an eternal void of nothingness after Hannibal’s breath on his cheek, Hannibal’s hand in his hair, Hannibal’s blood on his skin, Hannibal’s voice in his ear.

_For both of us._

But then there was the sharp white bite of air in his throat, unwelcome after he’d willingly pressed his last breath into the blood-soaked cotton of Hannibal’s shirt. Vague, disjointed flashes of being dragged from the watery arms of death he had meant to embrace. The dull, distant discomfort of rocks on aching muscle where he was lain on solid, unforgiving land, inert and in pain and _so fucking cold_. 

And then a darkness he had not bargained for when he wrapped his arm around Hannibal’s shoulder and pulled them both into the void. A churning, throbbing, restless darkness that smothered him beneath its weight and hurt with each ragged pull of air through waterlogged lungs. 

And when Will woke up again it was to beeping machines and the dim, ever-present glow of hospital lights in the empty nighttime. He woke up, and the bright illumination of Hannibal’s clarity, the immeasurable warmth of his presence, his regard, were gone.

Will Graham woke up again, but he woke in a dream. A fog descended over the world, blurring the edges and dimming the picture until nothing seemed quite as real. His life was as it was before, empty of the one person capable of rousing him from sleepy indifference.

Only now he knew he was asleep. Because this time, he remembered what it was like to be awake.

Almost a year passed.

Molly left him.

She made an effort at first, when he was still in the hospital. She came to visit and tried to talk. She cried and yelled and looked for some way to move forward. She tried. But her eyes lingered on Will’s bare ring finger, and his remained glued to the wrinkled bedsheets, glossy and unseeing.

It was never going to be the same as it had been. It couldn’t be, when the whole world had changed. No, not the whole world. Just him. He couldn’t spare the energy to reexamine their marriage, to pick apart the shoddy patchwork of a life he had built with someone else. Someone who had never been _his_ someone. And what would be the point, when it had been a sham all along? A wonderfully scripted play acted out with beautiful dedication. So skillfully performed that even he had fooled himself into thinking it might be anything more than a mundane, childish fairy tale. A simulation of a marriage.

_Bluebeard’s wife._

He was in the hospital for a little over six weeks, fighting first pneumonia, and then an infection from the shoulder wound that nearly killed him. Molly stopped making an effort after week three and sat in the plastic chair beside his bed, red-eyed and tight-lipped, working on a convincing imitation of Will’s distant stare. Once he had pulled through the worst of his infection fever, she stopped coming at all.

Will was… Despondent.

He felt as though he should have been hurt that Hannibal left him, alone and lost to fumble in the dark of night once again, but he wasn’t. He couldn’t be. Because he _understood_.

His ultimate curse. To see him. To see and to understand. 

He knew why Hannibal couldn’t stay, and couldn’t take Will with him. Will had finally recognized who he was, finally embraced the creature that he had always kept chained up in the deepest darkest parts of himself and become all Hannibal had wanted him to be.

 _All I ever wanted for you._.

But he couldn’t live with it. Couldn’t let himself have that, couldn’t give himself a life with the Chesapeake Ripper. So he threw them both off that cliff because dying together was better than living apart.

But Hannibal was a creature of survival. And _control_. Always with his infallible, unbreakable control. Living apart would not be easy, but Hannibal could do it, if he made himself.

Hannibal could do anything.

  
  
  
  


* * *

  
  
  


The lights had gone out sometime in the night.

Maybe he forgot to pay the electric bill again. Or maybe they just forgot that anyone was living out here, so far into the dark of the wilderness, miles and miles from the nearest town. It wasn’t much use keeping a whole power grid running for just one person, was it?

Will didn’t mind. He hardly used the lights in his cabin anyway, and his only real concern was the lack of power for his electric space heater. Water wouldn’t be an issue with the nearby stream and he could always buy gas tanks for his stove from the supply store some twenty miles down the road. But the fireplace was small and primarily decorative, not intended to heat the entirety of the space. 

Will checked the date for the first time in weeks, finding a spare battery to power up his unused cell phone and open the calendar app. He didn’t have wifi or cell service this far out, but the internal clock in the cheap machinery kept track on its own. There had been a chill in the air over the past week, an eerie silence falling over the surrounding forest as animals settled in for the coming winter.

It was October thirty-first.

He supposed he might have been preoccupied with the necessities of surviving the season, or finding a way to leave Alana a message so no one would bother trying to track him down once the snow started to fall, but none of that seemed very important. All he could think about as the hours crept by, slumped inside his threadbare armchair with a scratchy blanket and an overfilled glass of cheap whisky, was that it had been nearly a year. 

Nearly one whole year since he last saw his face, heard his voice.

When the sun set behind the tree line, confirming another day wasted staring at the wall and drinking himself into a stupor, Will dragged himself to his feet and stumbled to the small kitchen to dig out a few candles and a new box of matches. He didn’t really mind the dark, but he had a tendency to bump into things after his lips kissed the neck of the bottle, and he didn’t relish the thought of tripping over his threadbare carpet and breaking a leg. 

It would take too long for him to starve out here.

The candles cast eerie, flickering shadows against the rough wooden walls, not quite enough light to reach into the swaths of gloom that clung to the corners and crevices of the room.

He stood over the sink and ate two slices of bread gone stale from neglect, making an absent mental note to go catch something large enough to store in the outdoor freezer before it got too cold and game got scarce.

Hunting brought a pang of sadness now. Not for the animals, or for the careless deftness with which he slew and butchered them, but for companionship lost before it was even fully realized. It was one of the only times he felt anything stir beneath the dull haze of his apathy.

The dark had settled thick like a blanket by the time he carried a candle into the bathroom and coaxed the old faucets into running water through his cracked showerhead. He breathed a mental sigh of relief to feel the water turn hot against his palm, but didn’t bother with any sort of external expression. He stripped off his jeans and wool sweater, leaving them in a crumpled pile near the toilet, then peeled his boxers and thick socks off as well, tossing those out into the hallway for the dirty laundry. 

He stood in the shower for longer than he normally would, tipping his head back and letting the water run over his face and drip into his mouth. He felt more sober with each drop that splashed against the back of his closed eyelids, washing away some of the fog in his mind and weight in his limbs. When the hot pound of water against his back and shoulders turned lukewarm, he scrubbed his skin clean and rubbed shampoo into his hair, noticing that it had gotten long enough to stick to the underside of his jaw when he bent his head to rinse the suds from the back of his neck.

The bathroom was pleasantly warm when he climbed out, though the steam didn’t last longer than the time it took him to towel himself dry. He stood in front of the mirror and let the towel drop to the floor, eyeing himself in the dim candlelight. 

He could see every one of his ribs, outlined like teeth when he breathed out, just above the horrible smiling scar that stretched across his stomach. It flexed with every inhale, tightening against his skin like a rope. He raised a hand and touched it, tracing the rough edges. He couldn’t feel anything through the scar tissue, but the scrape of it against the pad of his finger sends a subtle chill down his spine.

A claiming mark. Though he’d already claimed Will long before that moment.

He was a painting of scars now, Hannibal’s marks mapped across the canvas of his skin. Each one was a signature confirming his work. He touched the angry red knot of scar tissue on his right shoulder, the long, clean line that split his face from cheek to jaw. He grazed over the long-faded crease etched straight and sure across half his forehead, now hidden under the disorganized fall of his hair, wet and curling in the cooling air. 

He forced himself to turn from the ghastly sight of his reflection, pale and flickering like a ghost, and slipped on a pair of sleep pants. He padded back out into the main room of the cabin, intending to collect his blankets and crawl uselessly into bed since there wasn’t enough light to read by, but something had him frozen in the doorway, breath catching in his throat in an instinctual bid to fall silent, ears straining.

He had heard something creak. Something about the sound set his teeth on edge, standing out incongruously from the typical din of the forest. He listened hard, trying to hear over the pound of his heartbeat, waiting for the sound to repeat itself. Had it been a floorboard outside the door? The house settling down into the cold? Whatever sound it was now hid under the howl of the wind through the trees, and Will heard nothing else that drew his attention. 

It had probably been wind pushing in at the old windows, or a tree settling outside. Hell, maybe an animal had crept too close to the house; it wouldn’t have been the first time. Regardless, no human ventured this far out in the light of day, let alone after nightfall.

But still, Will couldn’t shake the twitchy hypervigilance that crawled beneath his skin, causing him to stare around the room with wide eyes, searching out some flash of movement or hint of disturbance. There was nothing. A couple of the candles had burned out, leaving the cabin wrapped in dimness, but he could see clearly enough to know that everything was exactly as he had left it.

He stalked forward on silent feet and peered out of the windows, straining his eyes to make sense of the shadows and indistinct shapes that appeared through warped glass, but he couldn’t make out much. He told himself there wasn’t anything to see, anyway, and scolded himself for his irrational alarm.

He was annoyed with himself. He shouldn’t be afraid. There was nothing left to fear.

But _still_ his heart pounded a sickly, uneven pace in his chest and his head felt light, dread gripping his lungs with a clawed fist. He wasn’t even sure now that he had heard a sound at all. He may be imagining things again, his mind playing tricks on him in the absence of other suitable stimuli, conjuring something to fill the void. 

The feeling wouldn’t leave him, imagination galloping away without the reigns, taking control of his body in a way that it hadn’t in years. Nowhere outside his dreams, at least. His tongue was bitter with the fluttering wings of terror batting around the edges of his mind, and he pressed his lips together to breathe through his nose.

He could feel his pulse in his chest, in his throat, rushing thick and heavy as he crept across the floorboards. He briefly considered retrieving his shotgun from the closet, sliding a knife from the kitchen drawer or even digging his revolver out of the unopened suitcase tucked under his bed, but he dismissed these ideas as absurd overreactions. He wasn’t a child afraid of the dark.

He forced himself to duck into the alcove at the backdoor, doing it quickly so as to startle anything that might be lying in wait before it could startle him. There was, of course, nothing, and he huffed out an accusatory breath at his own ridiculousness despite the fact that the sound was much too loud in the silence, his own hearing still straining and searching for anything out of sync.

He turned to move back towards the bedroom, getting a couple of steps towards the small hallway before it happened all at once.

A solid arm wrapped around his chest, jerking him back, throwing his weight off balance and pinning his arms to his sides. The cold press of steel to the side of his neck was unmistakable, the pressure just enough to push an indentation into his carotid, letting him feel the sharp bite of the edge.

Will might have yelled, maybe meant to, but all that came out was a choked off gasp as dread burned away into bright keen panic. 

He struggled once, tried to jolt free of the arms that held him, but their grip was iron and unyielding, the chest pressed against his back firm, unshakable, and the razor-edge of the hunting knife was pushed close enough to sting. Will fell still, wary of nicking his artery and bleeding out on his worn oriental carpet. 

His pulse fluttered like a trapped bird beneath the quivering heave of his chest, and fear tore through his veins side by side with anticipation. He felt dizzy with the terror of it, but practically thrumming with the surge of adrenalin that lent a pointed awareness to each heartbeat that seemed to pass in slow motion.

The seconds ticked by in trembling stillness, and Will waited for the threat, or the shove, or the slice of the cold blade parting his skin like tissue paper. He considered risking the spilt blood and fighting his way out, using his elbows and nails and teeth, letting loose the fiercely desperate predator that lurked restless and eager behind his eyes. But then there was the press of a cold nose to the back of his neck, and the soft brush of a sigh skimming the bare skin of his shoulder.

And Will’s heart stopped beating, everything suspended for one long, frozen moment.

The restraining press of the arm that held him suddenly felt more like an embrace, the cold touch of the knife more like a caress, holding him in place with tender precision.

And when Will raised a shaking hand to grip lightly at the wrist that held the weapon, guided it away so he could step out and twist around to face him, Hannibal allowed it.

Will drank in the sight of him, mind blank, an empty vessel with which to collect every milligram of detail from the apparition that stood before him.

It was like he had stepped right out of one of Will’s dreams, only so much more real for the tiny imperfections that caught Will’s gaze as it raked over every inch of Hannibal Lecter. His hair was longer than Will remembered it, though not so long that it looked as though he hadn’t gotten a haircut or two during their time apart, and streaked with thicker strands of silver than had colored the dark honey brown a year ago. He had let his facial hair grow in as well, a thin, well-kept layer of graying scruff that only served to deepen the sharp lines of his cheekbones. He wore a black turtle neck and dark pants, clothes to fit the nocturnal artist he’d always been, and his hand held a wickedly curved hunting knife gripped loose and casual at his side.

His posture was the upright and relaxed stance of the predator, his person-suit peeled away to leave him radiant in his nakedness, and his eyes… His eyes were fathomless. Dark and slick like blood in the moonlight. They caught Will in their trap and held him there, hardly breathing.

The corners of Hannibal’s mouth tilted upwards ever so slightly, and Will’s chest contracted at the sight of that familiar, barely-there smile. 

“Hello, Will.”

And Will had been _so wrong_. He’d thought that the thousands of words that had fallen from that clever mouth, the endless conversations they had shared in the palace of Will’s mind had been a clear and faithful echo of Hannibal’s accent. He’d thought the timbre of the voice he heard in his dreams, both waking and asleep, and the cadence of his language had been a true match to the living breathing memory of the man. But it wasn’t.

It was a pale and hollow imitation, a colorless, emaciated perversion of the rich clarity that fell from Hannibal’s lips. The way his tongue curled around Will’s name.

How had he forgotten that?

And he must have been staring with quite the expression on his face, because he could see a hint of dangerous amusement flashing like a secret in the deepening lines around Hannibal’s mouth.

“You seem surprised to see me. Did I come at a bad time?”

“Did you come at a…” Will’s words came out on a faltered breath, not enough air in his lungs to support vocalization.

The barest twitch of an eyebrow, slightest inclination of his head, and Hannibal had spoken volumes. The information rushed through the air like a tidal wave, battering Will’s mind and nearly overwhelming him. 

“I will admit, it was quite rude of me not to knock at your front door like a proper guest should. Will you forgive me the intrusion?”

When Will didn’t answer, _couldn’t_ answer over the ocean tide dragging his mind beneath the smothering waves of emotional communication, the seconds ticked by in suspended silence. And Hannibal, though not so fluent in this language as Will had always been, was passable enough at reading the thoughts in his eyes to glean an understanding of the moment. His chin dipped a fraction of an inch, the gentle upward curve of his lips flattening out, and his eyes dimmed in subtle but staggeringly unhidden _disappointment_.

That look cut sharper than any knife.

“You truly did not think I would come for you.”

“I…” He struggled with the overpowering urge to protest, catching the words in his throat because he wasn’t quite sure of their honesty. Hadn’t he? Surely a part of him had always known it, that same utter certainty with which he had known what Hannibal was since the first time he saw one of the Ripper’s works. He’d known Hannibal would always come back to him. That they would always come back to each other, so long as they both possessed beating, bleeding hearts. And perhaps even after that.

And yet… He’d given up hope, hadn’t he? Chosen to wallow in his miserable loneliness rather than prepare for their inevitable reconciliation. Or more aptly, he had not allowed himself that hope, that certainty. Because to expect and not to receive may very well have killed him.

He should have had more faith.

He had given up on his God, and now his God was angry.

Hannibal stalked forward with strict precision, righteous fury flashing from the darkness of his eyes though every muscle of his body was tightly controlled. Will couldn’t stop himself from instinctually retreating, his backwards steps not quite as sure or steady as Hannibal’s. He didn’t travel far before the backs of his knees hit the arm of his couch and he was forced to hold his ground, more out of an unwillingness to turn his back on such an inexorable pursuit than any desire to hold onto what little pride he may have. 

Hannibal closed the distance between them, stopping only when the toes of his boots nearly brushed Will’s bare feet. He was close enough that Will could _smell_ him, the subtle hint of pine needles and the barely-there clean sent that had followed him into his dreams for years. Will found himself tipping his head up to keep those fathomless eyes in sight, unconsciously arching his back and baring his throat. Hannibal’s eyes flickered down to the exposed column of his neck and lingered there for just a moment, watching as he swallowed reflexively. 

“Did you really think you could live out this half-life, walking through the fog until you died in your sleep?” His voice was a magnetic rumble, lilting words deceptively treacherous in their calm delivery. He raised his empty hand, fingers hovering almost delicately over the bones of Will’s collar, which he now traced with his eyes, and Will forced himself to take a shuddering breath. He watched Hannibal’s face from under his eyelashes, ravenous for every twitch of detail. “Died old and alone and numbed into a stupor? Or, more likely,” Here his eyes flickered sideways to the half-empty bottle of Old Crow still sitting beside his armchair, a curl of disdain gracing his top lip. “Drunk yourself to death, or repeated history and stepped off a lonely cliff somewhere full of nostalgia and self-indulgent melancholy?”

Will swallowed again, his throat clicking at the sudden dryness that left his tongue tacky and fumbling. The hand that hovered over his chest drifted upwards with easy, unhurried intent, and Hannibal’s fingers curled over his throat, the press of his grip proprietary and firm. It wasn’t tight enough to restrict his air supply, but it held him frozen in place all the same. He leaned in close enough for his next words to brush warm and heavy over Will’s open mouth.

“Did you really think that I would let you go?”

Will jolted at the touch and the words, one hand gripping viciously at the arm of the couch he was pressed against to ward off the weakness in his knees. 

He’d gone hazy with the intoxication of Hannibal’s presence, his touch, simultaneously drugged by it and also more awake, more aware than he’d been in months and months. Since that night they fell into the water. There was a sharp electric edge, a neon tinge to the colors of the world, _hunger_ creeping up the walls of his hollow body, left starving for so long.

And now he was here. Come to wake him up at last.

“Hannibal…” His name came out on a tremor of voice, brokenly uttered around the racing of his heart and the rapid, shallow rise and fall of his bare chest. His frantic excitement only increased as Hannibal’s mouth spread in a self-satisfied smile, baring his imperfect teeth with indulgence. The expression was both darkly satisfying and terrifyingly menacing in its savage unrestraint, Hannibal’s person-suit stripped away and discarded somewhere far behind them.

Hannibal reached back to tuck his hunting knife into a discrete leather sheath strapped to his belt. Will could barely tear his eyes away from the burning amber of his stare long enough to flicker down, watching his movements, but he forced himself to catch every detail as Hannibal reached into one pocket and drew something out. 

His hand was a warm, solid rig around the front of his neck, and Will swallowed to feel those fingers flex in reply, assuring him of their unwavering presence. Reminding him that Hannibal wasn’t going to let him go. Not this time.

He held the item up, tucked between them so Will could see it in the dim flickering candlelight. It looked like some sort of dental container, the type you might keep a retainer in. His breath caught in his chest as Hannibal flicked it open with his thumb, pushing the lid back to reveal what was nestled inside.

It took Will a moment to understand what he was seeing, and the resulting rush of adrenalin and endorphins nearly made him buckle under a wave of dizzy, heady fear. The prosthetic fangs, clearly designed to fit over Hannibal’s teeth, would have looked utterly ridiculous if they weren’t so horrifying in their gleaming sharpness, like two deadly needles created for the express purpose of _ripping_ into him. 

“I have always wanted to taste you, Will.” His eyes were drawn back to Hannibal’s magnetic gaze, and the hunter’s pupils were pools of black, drowning out all traces of his kinder honey coloring. His voice dropped to the low rumble of a growl, and Will shivered when it rolled over him. “To consume you.”

His body wanted to move closer, yearned to draw into the heat of the creature that had called out to him through the nights, year after year, but he was frozen in genuine fear as Hannibal stroked his thumb over the taut, trembling column of his throat and plucked the artificial teeth from their case, letting the plastic fall to the ground with a muted clatter. 

He wanted to speak. Or scream. His skin itched with the urge to _run_ as Hannibal slotted the dentures over his top teeth, lips pulled back in a luxurious snarl, dark eyes hooded and a clump of platinum hair falling like art over his forehead. His pulse jumped and his blood rushed in his ears, tearing like fire through his veins, pumping all the harder in the face of its imminent spilling. 

Hannibal might kill him. He really might.

Perhaps even he wasn’t sure what he planned to do, because the flash of his eyes when he looked at Will was wild and possessive, gleaming darkness that cut through the thick air like a knife, vicious and wounding. 

But despite every instinct in his body fighting to cling to life with brittle teeth and nail, urging him to lash out, to flee, to resist this ravenous beast that intended to eat him alive, he knew that he wouldn’t. He wouldn’t run. He wouldn’t fight. He could, and he might even succeed where he failed before, in tearing Hannibal down with him. But he wouldn’t.

He didn’t want to anymore. 

Hannibal slid his hand up, cradling Will’s jaw in a harsh caress, and forced his chin up to bare that long, smooth plane of unblemished skin. He tipped his head to the side, and the flash of fangs between his parted lips made Will’s gut clench with a flash of religious epiphany. Because this, this was his beautiful, deadly creature unveiled.

He bent his head, and the brush of filed canines pricked cold against Will’s skin, making him shudder and gasp wetly. Hannibal’s fingers curled around to the back of his neck, tangling in the longer locks of his wet hair and gripping tightly, holding him in place. His other hand found Will’s wrist and gripped it hard enough to bruise, pinning it ruthlessly to the arm of the couch.

For a moment there was nothing but the frantic pound of Will’s heart, a lingering, ethereal awareness that these might be his last frenzied breathes. Then a quick, quiet intake of breath as Hannibal’s fingers tightened unforgivingly. 

He sank his teeth into Will’s neck, right over the thick tendon that ran down into his shoulder, and it _hurt_.

It burned, the jagged edges of pain worse than anything Will had ever felt. Worse than the throbbing, slipping agony of being gutted. Worse than the sharp, deep sting of being stabbed. Worse than the hopeless cold of the ocean sinking into his bones.

He could feel Hannibal _tearing into him_ , ruining the flesh of his neck with unapologetic savagery, wrenching the tissue apart, and it didn’t stop. He bled and bled, wet hot slick leaking down into the hollow of his collarbone, and Hannibal drank him. Consumed him.

 _Ate him_.

Will found himself grasping desperately at Hannibal’s hip and shoulder, his nails digging in, grip bruising, a harsher version of their last embrace. Desperate where before they had been languorous. He heard himself gasping, the air scraping in his throat like he was burning from the outside and the inside all at once, and he pushed his erection insistently against the hard muscle of Hannibal’s thigh. 

Hannibal made a noise, a low growl of a moan, and Will could feel it vibrating in his neck, beneath the torn flesh, _inside_ him. 

It fucking hurt.

He felt like his head would be ripped from his shoulders, such was the overwhelming agony radiating out from where those carved bone teeth were latched into the skin and muscle. It throbbed harshly with each pulse, his heart working feverishly to push gush after gush of his lifeblood out over Hannibal’s waiting tongue, filling his open mouth and dripping down clammy skin, staining them both with the color of Will’s insides.

It felt like it went on forever, the ecstatic, delirious pain only mounting with each passing second. And it ended abruptly, unexpectedly, torn away from Will with almost violent suddenness.

Hannibal finally pulled his teeth out, and that hurt too. The drag of his tongue over the aching skin was slick, heavy. Will sagged against him, hot and sick and throbbing, his breath stuttering like sobs through his clenched teeth, and his face was wet with more than just blood. Hannibal’s face was smeared with it, his mouth and chin stained scarlet, dripping down onto the collar of his shirt, darkening the fabric that stretched over his jugular.

He pressed a hand to Will’s neck, putting pressure on the ragged, leaking wound. Will whimpered brokenly and he caressed his throat with unexpected tenderness, thumb stroking soothingly over the swell of his Adam’s apple.

Each breath was torture, dragging down his trachea like the rough burn of smoke filling his lungs. He wondered, briefly and somewhat distantly, if Hannibal had managed to rip into his airway. If his lungs would fill with blood and he would suffocate on his own fluids, choking down his love’s last gift to him. But he didn’t feel himself fading from lack of oxygen. The pain didn’t numb and the world didn’t drift out of sharp, technicolor focus. There was just Hannibal’s hand, holding him together at the split in his seams, and his warm breath, ghosting damp and alive across Will’s cheek.

He realized that his legs had given out at some point, and he was sagged against Hannibal and the arm of the couch. Hannibal held him there, pressed into place by the solid weight of his own body, and every point of contact between them thrummed with awareness. It took a while for Will to register his lack of fear. He felt like he was dying, slow and torturously, but there was no more anxiety. The puzzle pieces had slotted back into place, the tea cup had come together, and Will was back where he belonged.

When he found his voice, it was wrecked and rough, the words cracking on their way out. 

“Never thought… You’d borrow your design from... Such a brute beast as the dragon.” He pressed the joke into Hannibal’s jaw like an offering, eyes fluttering closed as he tipped his head and let Will’s mouth press clumsily to skin coarse with stubble.

“Not at all.” Hannibal insisted calmly, unoffended. He had pulled the prosthetics from his mouth at some point. His voice was cool and sated, and Will let it soothe him like a balm. “I simply needed a specific set of tools, and these were best suited to my purposes.”

Will managed a hum, neither questioning nor comprehending, and Hannibal elected to continue.

“I needed to pierce you deep enough to drink my fill.” His thumb drifted across the ridge of Will’s jaw, the pressure of his palm never faltering, and Will did nothing to suppress his quiet shiver. “Without the risk of ruining your flesh so much that you might die.”

It was true. Will had seen it before. _Flashes of roiling storm clouds over the Chesapeake, the scent of blood and sweat and fallen dragon_. If Hannibal had taken a bite out of him, torn out his throat with unrestrained brutality, Will would have bled out in minutes. But he hadn’t. He had chosen not to.

He still felt like he was bleeding out, like a hole had been torn through his neck, leaving his blood to trickle down his skin until there was nothing left. He felt ruined, torn beyond repair, but when he reached up with one clumsy hand to nudge Hannibal’s palm away and feel the blood-slick skin, he prodded only two small holes with the blunt tips of his fingers. The whole area ached viciously, making it hard to move his head, hard to swallow. He knew it would be worse after some time had passed, once the bruising had set in and the tissue had become swollen and inflamed.

Hannibal gently but firmly brushed his hand aside to look at it, pulling away from Will for a clearer view, and he made a small, pleased sound at what he saw.

“See? The puncture wounds are already clotting. The bleeding will stop soon and you will be just fine. If missing a few ounces of blood.”

Will stared at him through bleary eyes, a roiling churn of unnamable emotions making him sway on his feet. 

“Just another scar to add to the collection.”

He’d meant it jokingly, perhaps even scathing, a pretense of flippancy, but it came out hoarse and saturated with unintentional meaning.

Hannibal stared back at him, a flare of something fiercely protective and proprietorial setting fire to his eyes. With slow, controlled intent, he trailed his hands down Will’s sides until he could press him down onto the arm of the couch, leaving him to sit there, propped up. He let his gaze trail down the skin of Will’s neck, and chest, lingering indulgently on the smeared mess of crimson he had left there, self-satisfied. He followed the trail with his hands, touch warm and feather light, making Will twitch with sensation. 

His fingers found the knot of scar tissue on Will’s shoulder, tracing and exploring, mapping it with careful thoroughness. Then his touch slid down to Will’ stomach, dragging goosebumps across his damp skin, and he followed the thick, uneven seam to its end, making sure Will felt every centimeter of his caress. He traced it over once, twice, again, each pass building the heat in Will’s belly until he felt thick and full with it, his mouth saturated with cloying sweetness. 

When he looked up at Hannibal’s face, catching the expression of untainted idolatry that held his sharp features with a gentleness that hardly ever found its way to the surface, his breath hitched and he flushed in pleasure. He ducked his head again to watch those capable, dangerous hands glide over his bared torso like he was made of porcelain. It was intoxicating. 

Hannibal traced each scar, stroking the healed slice along his cheek, fingering the old, faded line hidden under his hair. He claimed them all, one by one. Claimed them as his.

He returned to Will’s neck last, sliding the tips of his fingers over the swelling, painful bite mark. He held his fingers up for Will to see, slick and dark with his blood. It looked black in the dimness, moonlight filtering in through the windows, and each breath felt reverent.

Will met Hannibal’s eyes over his offering, and in that moment, they _saw_ each other unequivocally. He tipped his chin down, lashes fluttering closed as he took Hannibal’s slickened fingers into his mouth and tasted his own blood. It was coppery, dark and rich like a heavy wine. Hannibal’s breath left his lungs in a sharp, shaky exhale, and he stroked the pads of his fingers across Will’s tongue.

Will curled is lips around them, sucking lightly and laving the blood away, coating his mouth in the taste. He let his teeth scrape as he pulled back, Hannibal’s fingers catching wet and clinging to the flesh of his mouth, and Will whispered against them.

“ _Beautiful_.”

He heard Hannibal swallow, conspicuously thick, and warmth filled him like a heavy cotton, slotting into all the places that had been left empty for far too long.

“Will…” Hannibal breathed out like a prayer, and Will felt… Whole. “Would you like to come with me?”

He reached into his pocket for something, but Will was already nodding. He stared up at Hannibal like the zealot he was, come to worship at the altar of his God. 

Hannibal’s expression as he held out the small white pill, smeared a bit with impossibly graphic crimson, was a sharp smile. His eyes consumed and his teeth flashed, bright and pure in his unbridled anticipatory pleasure. There was still blood on his lips, and Will wanted to lick it away.

Instead, when Hannibal offered the pill up between them with just as much weight as he’d offered his broken heart in Palermo, Will matched his gaze measure for measure and took the tablet between his teeth, unquestioning.

He swallowed it dry, the flex of his throat like sandpaper and broken glass, and Hannibal leaned down to breathe him in, eyelids falling in appreciation. “I knew you would, Will.”

  
  
  
  


* * *

  
  
  


Hazy flashes, images and light, imprinted like the fragmented frames of old film.

He was wearing a wool sweater and his father’s coat. Hannibal slid thick socks onto his feet, deft fingers doing up the laces of his winter boots with practiced ease.

For a moment, Will felt like he was falling off the couch, the wooden floorboards wavering closer, coming up to meet him. Hannibal’s hand was warm on the back of his head, and the rumble of words over the shell of his ear was thick and slow. All he heard was the accent, like velvet and sin.

The car was moving fast. Streetlights flashed by, floating strange and bright overhead, like drifting stars lost in the gloom of space. The glow of the dashboard was blue and otherworldly, and Will had the uncanny sensation that they were hurtling through the atmosphere, taking flight in the syrupy darkness.

Hannibal’s hands were beautiful. Purple against the leather.

The cold of the air stung his cheeks, made him aware of the numbing tip of his nose. The crunch of grass beneath their boots was loud. The loudest thing he could hear. He wanted to lay down on it, to see if it was soft like he imagined.

It was dark inside. The furniture in the living room was familiar, like a house he had lived in once in a dream. Had Hannibal lived here with him? He must have. He looked so right climbing the stairs ahead, stepping light and sure on the edges to remain completely silent. 

The grip of the knife was warm against his palm, fitted perfectly under the curl of his fingers. He liked it there. It belonged. He belonged. Here. They both did.

The sheets were dark maroon. Jack’s eyes were wide, teeth bared like he was yelling again. Always agitated. Bossy. He said Will’s name like a command. Will’s gaze was drawn to Hannibal’s face, placid and rapturous over Jack’s shoulder, biceps flexing beautifully as he held the silk rope taut around Jack’s straining neck.

His eyes told Will _everything_.

Jack’s eyes thought that Will owed him something. Belonged to him. All Will saw was the man who hunted him. Chased him out of the country. Coveted and hoarded his greatest treasure, only to use the just and glorious strike of Excalibur like a common hammer. He was insolent. He was sanctimonious. His very existence was unacceptably _rude_.

He remembered how it felt when skin and muscle gave way under the push of his blade. That moment of resistance, followed by gratifying ease, a slick muffled sound. He put his fingers in, wriggling them to get through the stubborn laceration. The blood felt so hot inside, before it got a chance to cool in the air.

The light bounced bright and harsh off the white tile of the bathroom. The blood smeared over the walls and pooling on the floor looked fake. Too bright, like red food dye.

His wrist hurt and his eyes stung. 

Jack sat in the bathtub, staring at the ceiling, one thick arm falling over the edge to drip fat drops of cherry red from his fingertips. Will could see the base of his tongue where his throat was ripped out, a pink knot of muscle buried under ragged flesh. 

Hannibal sat casually on the porcelain ledge, bent over to slice with smooth expertise into the meat of one thigh. He dissected and skinned, and Will blinked in interest as he pulled a large Ziploc bag open with his teeth. The select of meat looked a little like a large chicken breast, pressed between the transparent plastic like that.

A flash of his reflection in the mirror. His face was covered in blood, his mouth smeared with it. His tongue felt sticky and a thick iron taste clung to the back of his throat. His sweater stuck to his skin, the fibers damp and heavy and stained. His neck was a livid purple blue black all across one side, aching like a kiss. The kind of kiss that punches the air right out of you.

It was hard to break the breastbone open, and his grip kept slipping off Jack’s ribs and the skin felt so much thinner and more delicate than he expected. But he wanted it. It was hard to pull the heart out, like the toughened tendons and large arteries and veins were clinging on with desperate fanaticism, but Hannibal helped. He slotted his hands alongside Will’s and knew just where to dig in to sever the connections.

It was heavy and hard. Rubbery.

They left the heart in the kitchen, placed delicately on a white china plate.

Will felt more aware as they walked to the car. It was the dark midnight blue of predawn, and Hannibal had parked outside the quiet neighborhood, on the edge of a church lot near a wide empty field. 

He stopped beside the hood of the car, not quite ready to cross to his side and slide into the passenger seat, his skin sticky with Jack Crawford.

He stared out towards the horizon, watching as the sky was streaked with the bloody trails of sunrise. Hannibal came to stand beside him, close enough that their arms brushed. And when they glanced sideways at each other, Will’s eyes flicking over parted lips and the glint of teeth before searching out the honey in his eyes, he didn’t have to say it.

_It’s beautiful._

And Will might have still been a little fucked up off whatever Hannibal had given him, but it felt like the most normal thing in the world to curl an arm around his neck, snagging him down to push their mouths together in a bloody, messy, vicious kiss.

Hannibal let Will push him up against the car, let him chase the taste of dark sweet indulgence and the thrill of the wild hunt, total abandon.

“You planned this.” Will panted his realization into the scrape of Hannibal’s jaw. “Did it so I wouldn’t have a choice.” Hannibal made a soft hum of noise, but Will silenced it with the dip of his tongue. Whispered against his lips. “Now I _have_ to run away with you.”

He pulled back with a sharp bite, leaving a violent indentation in Hannibal’s bottom lip. “You didn’t have to.”

Hannibal searched his face, and Will’s answering smile was a feral thing. 

“You could have just asked.”

When they drove down the empty roads towards the state line, flying over cold black concrete with the sun on their heels, Will held Hannibal’s hand curled over his knee. They kept their gazes forward, chasing the shadows.


End file.
